ATWT Canceled

[Ann_SS]

Ultimately, no television show lasts forever and it is unreasonable to think that any one specific soap will. All television shows get stale as the same characters do the same things over in different ways. It is repetitive to watch the same couple break up and make over over and over again even if it is for different reasons.

This version of the soap genre is dead for the time being. A new one will emerge in a few years. It may be a serial/reality type soap or a telenovela format that is cheap to produce so that it can survive the low ratings due to fewer people at home to watch.

[JackPeyton]

P&G have much more to do with that than CBS, i believe.

Also, if CBS was striving for it to get the axe for years... it would have gotten it years ago.

[marceline]

With the economy the way it is I don't think so. Soaps are dying but the economy essentially put them on an ice floe and set them adrift.

[DRW50]

The beauty of a soap opera is that characters to some degree grow and change. They still make mistakes, but different types of mistakes, and in time, they move on to new partners, or stay with their partner and have stories that are about fighting obstacles together. Some characters leave and other characters arrive. History is used to make future story.

Soaps don't do that anymore. I think that's what hurts them the most. They don't know how to write for older characters, they don't know how to bring in new characters, they don't know how to write for couples. Holden and Lily broke up and made up over and over when they were first together, and they both used and discarded various other people, but ATWT still managed to make you care. Today, it seems impossible.

[Sylph]

In this regard being no different then primetime serialised shows. They use something that happen in season 1 in season 7.

Or no different from a theatre play. People grow there in an hour. Or in a novel. In 230 pages. This is not unique to soaps.

It does seem impossible precisely because people got tired of it all. Same couples broken and reinstated a million times again and again. Isn't one of the most common comments from people who once used to watch but now don't — They're still doing that triangle? Followed by and an unspoken comment: No wonder they're cancelling them.

Some things you can do only so many times.

Sheffer, your favourite writer, once said about ATWT that it had people being in prison 5 times, married and divorced 12 times, had 854 children, cheated, did fraudulent business and that one just doesn't know what to do with them anymore. Domestic cutesy little stories are nice, those about human emotions etc., but those don't bring in viewers.

[DRW50]

The big difference is that soaps can span generations. Stories which were forgotten years before can be used to drive material later on. ATWT nixed Bob and Kim and killed their child in the early 70s. 15 or so years later, new writers and producers mined that past to help propel ATWT forward.

There's a certain satisfaction in watching a well-written program where people you know and care about change with you. That can happen in primetime, yes, but generally, primetime serialised shows are lucky to have four or five strong seasons, and many of those shows bear almost no resemblance to their former selves within a few years.

That's not about characters staying around too long, that's about bad writing. Even then, I only hear that about a handful of shows, like B&B. ATWT is a show which generally benefited from the "Are they still around?" types of characters. It was the newer characters, the ones brought in or recast in this decade, who made the show circle the drain.

You can do anything on a soap. You can take characters anywhere you want them to go. The only limitation is the budget and your imagination. Good writers and producers know how to make that happen. The failing of the format is on the lack of talent and the lack of trust or respect, not on the genre itself.

That's what brought viewers to soaps for decades. When those stories faded away, so did daytime.

[Sylph]

Other shows can span generations. Novels can span generations and centuries. There is nothing in soap operas which wasn't done before. It is just differently arranged. I have seen at least a dozen soap opera writers, either dialogue writers, script editors or head writers themselves, who've after being asked about what kind of advice would you give you younger, wannabe soap writers said: Steal plots from classics.

Yes, many shows bear no resemblance, but many do. Yes, many are less popular and known than daytime dramas, but there are those which influence television much more than soaps did. And, of course, those that did soapy better than soaps.

You can do anything anywhere. That's quite banal. No matter how good the writing is after seeing the same bloody story over 20 years in 7 different incarnations, after seeing a couple break up and reconcile 22 times, and marry and divorce 15 times, it just becomes to much. Even when the writing is "good", it is recycling. People are tired of the same things. You may like Bob and Kim, but there are others who've seen that tale. 5583 times. Same for all the other couples.

No, it didn't. Just look at now (in)famous MarkH graphs. They have been declining ever since they were created. Only small spikes which fall precipitously in a year or six months and the soaps becomes poorer for a million viewers.

Soaps have failed because their stories do not reflect the contemporary society and problems people face in it. They are frozen in 1989 in some small Midwestern town doing the same cr*p thinking nostalgia or whatever will eventually make people come back. A lethal illusion.

[DRW50]

I'm not sure what we're disagreeing about then. You say soaps are differently arranged. I say the different arrangement is what makes the soaps unique and gives them a perspective and life that other genres don't have.

There's also a big difference between reading a set of novels that span generations and actually watching the show unfold over generations, aging in real time with the actors or characters.

That's true, but shows which tick all those boxes are very rare. You have primetime shows that the critics fawn over, but which are soon proven to be a flash in the pan. You have primetime shows which excel at all sorts of melodramatic cliches, but which are hollow. Primetime shows which span for many years, which build on and respect their history, which allow us to see characters we know and understand go through life with viewers, they're not as common.

People have seen everything in entertainment a million times. If we just say, "We can't do this, it's been done," then we would never read, or watch TV or movies or plays, or listen to music, or look at artwork. It's not what you do, it's how you do it.

Bob and Kim broke up once, stayed apart for well over a decade, then had many stories which were about how strong their relationship was, how they overcame obstacles. They broke up again once, when Bob had an affair. An affair story is "banal," I guess, but in this case, it was also extremely well-told, probably one of the best and most real stories about adultery I can remember on a soap.

ATWT could have said, back when they put them together again, "Oh that's so dull, they were already together, who wants to see that?" Instead, they decided to take the risk, and I think the risk paid off.

Primetime TV has been declining since it was created too. The networks didn't keep soaps on this long because of love. They kept them on because soaps made them a lot of money. I'm sure if SON had been around in 1972 we may have heard, "Daytime is dying, what does it matter, soaps are dying, don't blame the show, nothing can be done," when Irna Phillips returned to ATWT and drove the ratings down. Instead, CBS and P&G made major changes, and ATWT's ratings improved. What did we get this decade? A lot of people who obviously did not give a sh!t about turning ATWT around. They cared more about going to the press and making excuses. That's what it's all about now. Telling us they aren't to blame for killing this genre.

Daytime has gone up and down, but their stronger ratings were when they told emotional stories. ATWT was actually the first new soap which most heavily gambled on emotional, psychological tales, stretched out to a half hour. It started out with middling ratings, and then, as people got to know the show, ratings went up, and up, and they became #1. So there was something in those simple domestic plots which appealed to people, and kept them loyal for a long time.

I think it's the fear of nostalgia, fear of being seen as unhip, which helped kill soaps in the first place. They have to be thuggish, and violent, and cold, and full of empty-headed bimbos who are kept in their place by wannabe mobsters or alpha males. It's a very depressing and ugly mix of what men like Guza or Sheffer pine for -- the people whose heroes are Don Draper or Tony Soprano.

The sad part is I'd say soaps were probably much more progressive and contemporary in 1989 than they are now. I know ATWT was. And a lot of the stories on ATWT in 1989 were more relevant to 2009 than just about anything on soaps these days.

[Ann_SS]

I still say that after a while the audience gets tired of the same characters doing the same or even different things on any tv show. There is only so much story to tell with the same characters no matter how well the writer tells it. After all, you stop with one show and you restart with a bunch of new characters in a different place, doing the same things and the audience is refreshed. Soaps simply cannot go on forever. It is untenable.

[JackPeyton]

the biggest issue with soaps is rather simple...

they have not kept up with the times. when soaps were thriving they were groundbreaking, trying new things, telling current social issues... now? they have not only not progressed over the years, they have inf act regressed. its pathetic.

[DRW50]

I think it depends on the quality of stories, and on the actor in the role, and on the characters around them. I think you could still tell a lot of stories about Lucinda, or Kim, or, if he were still on the show, John, because to me they never felt stale. Someone like Dusty, who has only been around since 2003 (I don't see this as the same character who was on the show in the 80s), I do think he became very stale and tiresome, because how many times did he just mumble and then go "save" some woman, then move on to the next victim?

I agree. Soaps are constantly trying to pander to a lot of people who probably didn't watch soaps in the first place.

[Sylph]

To you. Just like someone likes Dusty. It's a majority question. If the majority dislikes what it's seeing, you have the decline.

[DRW50]

I think a majority of people enjoyed stories with John, Lucinda, Kim. I don't mean to put that out as fact, it's obviously just my opinion, but they were frontburner characters for years and years at a time when the show was very popular or critically acclaimed, or both. The show for a long time generally knew how to write for them and make them still seem relevant and a valuable part of the show. It was only in the last decade that this really changed.

Even a lot of people who like Dusty probably haven't been thrilled with his stories over the past several years. And the storyline the actor wanted and clearly enjoyed (the relationship with Bonnie) was backburnered and lamely finished, perhaps because of fear of interracial relationships.

I think the problem was the show as a whole became very unfocused, poorly written. It got past the point of, "I don't like this character, but I know other people do. I have other stories I want to see." It became, "Nothing on the show is working, and any stories which might work spin off the rails soon enough." They hadn't given people reason to invest in stories for their favorites or tolerate stories which involved those who weren't their favorites.

The show may have improved some lately, which is open for debate, but I guess it was too late.

[JaneAusten]

I won't challenge the point about Goutman and Passanante. Stale and used up on ATWT IA they should have been fired ages ago. To keep a show somewhat fresh I think you need writing and production changes every few years. But then in some cases, even changing writers(ie; AMC and Y&R) doesn't guarantee positive change.

I do though not agree with catering to fan demands. I think good writers know if it;s a compelling story, whether it breaks up a popular pairing or not, kills off a popular character, viewers will follow. I just think fanbases have partially contributed to the problems that exist today or should I say show's catering to them. I just don't know how a show can determine which fanbased is most important.

As far as advertisers, I think it's naive to think a show can just lose one big advertiser and find another. As if Ford for example dropping as an advertiser means it would be easy to sign up Toyota or Honda. To me it's not a whole different than lobbyists in Washington who use their money and backing to influence constituencies and legislative decisions. Sadly it's a nature of the times.Advertisers can influence because they have the power and money to. And network television is not unique to this it applies across all businesses. It's to me why cable is a much more viable avenue for a lot of productions because they aren't solely reliant on advertising dollars for their viability. Network TV is for the most part.

[Sylph]

No, no uniqueness. Soaps are staged serialised novels, to put it that way.

But it won't pay off a third time. In 1868 Georges Polti did an extensive survey of literature and declared there are no more than 36 dramatic situations. It's been done. The problem with soaps is: it's been done, same stories go one after the other instead of waiting 10 years to tell the same, they are badly written etc. They suffocate viewers with the same recycled garbage over and over again incessantly without pause.